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Brazil’s president has the coronavirus


Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro Associated Press/Photo by Eraldo Peres (file)

Brazil’s president has the coronavirus

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said on Monday that an X-ray showed his lungs were clean. The next day, the 65-year-old leader told reporters in Brasília he had COVID-19. “I’m well, normal,” said Bolsonaro, adding he wanted to walk around but couldn’t because of medical restrictions. Bolsonaro waited to impose lockdowns in Brazil and has shaken hands with supporters, often without a mask. The U.S. Embassy in Brasília said Ambassador Todd Chapman will undergo testing after celebrating the Fourth of July with Bolsanaro.

How is Brazil handling the coronavirus pandemic? The country has more than 1.6 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, with nearly 65,500 deaths and more than 1 million recoveries, according to Johns Hopkins University. That’s just a little more than 763 infections per 100,000 people. However, the true numbers could be higher: Alexandre Naime Barbosa, a medical professor at São Paulo State University, told Reuters underreporting could make the official number too small by a factor of five to 10.

Dig deeper: Read Mindy Belz’s report about how Belgium responded to COVID-19.


Seth Johnson Seth is a correspondent for WORLD. He is a World Journalism Institute graduate and a journalism student at Bob Jones University. Seth resides in Indianapolis, Ind.


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